Exhausted with the struggle, we sat in silence for some time, facing each other. Shakro glanced covetously toward the spot, where I had flung the red muslin, and said:
"What were we fighting about? Fa—Fa—Fa! It's very stupid.
I did not steal it from you did I? Why should you care?
I was sorry for you that is why I took the linen.
You have to work so hard, and I cannot help you in that way,
so I thought I would help you by stealing. Tse'! Tse'!
"I made an attempt to explain to him how wrong it was to steal.
"Hold your tongue, please! You're a blockhead!" he exclaimed contemptuously; then added: "When one is dying of hunger, there is nothing for it but to steal; what sort of a life is this?"
I was silent, afraid of rousing his anger again.
This was the second time he had committed a theft.
Some time before, when we were tramping along the shores
of the Black Sea, he stole a watch belonging to a fisherman.
We had nearly come to blows then.
"Well, come along," he said; when, after a short rest, we had once more grown quiet and friendly.
So we trudged on. Each day made him grow more gloomy, and he looked at me strangely, from under his brows.
As we walked over the Darial Pass, he remarked:
"Another day or two will bring us to Tiflis. Tse'! Tse'!"
He clicked his tongue, and his face beamed with delight.
"When I get home, they will ask me where I have been? I shall tell them I have been travelling. The first thing I shall do will be to take a nice bath. I shall eat a lot. Oh! what a lot. I have only to tell my mother 'I am hungry!' My father will forgive when I tell him how much trouble and sorrow I have undergone. Tramps are a good sort of people! Whenever I meet a tramp, I shall always give him a rouble, and take him to the beer-house, and treat him to some wine. I shall tell him I was a tramp myself once. I shall tell my father all about you. I shall say: 'This man—he was like an elder brother to me. He lectured me, and beat me, the dog! He fed me, and now, I shall say, you must feed him.' I shall tell him to feed you for a whole year. Do you hear that, Maxime?"